46 



from all other levies, and is of course gradually 

 diminishing in amount, as the persons entitled to 

 receive it are removed by death. The money re- 

 quisite for the other poor is supplied from local 

 funds, arising from general assessments, made for 

 the maintenance of bridges, for repair of roads, 

 drains, and embankments, for the support of schools, 

 and for some other similar purposes. The practice 

 of supporting the indigent is of very recent date, 

 and has not hitherto produced the effect of lessening 

 the sympathy which the needy feel for each other, 

 or the charity which the more affluent exercise 

 towards their distressed neighbours ; and the sense 

 of shame yet remains as a bar against application to 

 the communal taxes, except in the greatest extre- 

 mity. 



A very intelligent and benevolent Nobleman, at 

 whose house I spent a few days, assured me, that in 

 the extensive, but thinly peopled district where he 

 had a share in the directing the assessments, and 

 expenditure of the local taxes, there was but one 

 family which subsisted wholly on those taxes ; and 

 that others depended on the kindness of relatives 

 and friends, with some occasional assistance from the 

 local fund. 



In general the Soil of the Maritime Provinces of 

 Prussia is so light, that it may be easily ploughed 

 with Two Oxen, and those of diminished size, and 

 no great strength. I have not unfrequently seen, on 

 the smaller portions of Land, a single cow drawing 

 the plough ; and whilst the plough was guided by the 

 owner, the cow was led by his wife. The more 

 tenacious soils, on the banks of the streams, are 

 commonly but of small extent. There is indeed a 

 large portion of land in the Delta, formed by the 

 separation of the Nogat from the Vistula, between 

 Derschau and Marienburg, which, under a good sys- 

 tem of management, would be highly productive, and 



